ABSTRACT
This is sometimes viewed as a tendency shared by a great many people, at other times, a strategy employed by those possessed of high SELF-ESTEEM seeking further boosts. In the first meaning, there is an inclination shared by all humans to compare themselves with others, specifically with others who are less accomplished or skilled or appear deficient in some way. The downward comparison, as it is called, permits a favorable impression of the person making the comparison. ‘‘In daily life, we do not always have the luxury of confining social comparisons to the realm of imagination, manipulating them to serve our needs for self-evaluation and self-enhancement,’’ reflect Julie Juola Exline and Marci Lobel. But, in sport, competitors can do exactly that. Self-enhancement typically occurs after success: it involves aug-
menting one’s own performance by referring to, for example, how one was suffering from a bad lane draw yet still won, or was out drinking the night before, while rivals were in bed early. In a study by Harry Prapavessis et al.: ‘‘Self-enhancement was restricted to individuals with high self-esteem who claimed handicaps.’’ By contrast, those experiencing failure sometimes strive for SELF-
PROTECTION by discounting their performance as, for instance, an ‘‘off-day’’ or ‘‘not the real me out there, today.’’ It has been suggested that self-enhancement is affected not only by
PERSONALITY, disposition, and other personal attributes, but also by SOCIALIZATION in particular cultures. Concluding their research, Jerry Burger and Amy Lynn allude to the more general meaning of the term, though with qualifications: ‘‘These observations are consistent with investigations that find a tendency for self-enhancement among Americans but not among Japanese citizens.’’
